October 15, 2009

At some point during Fashion Week in New York, an interviewer asked me "Why are blogs better than magazines?" I think I said something polite, but pulled a tiny face first- what?!

I'm tired of the blogs vs. magazines debate because they are good for different things and each one has a different goal. There are some blogs I would read over some magazines, of course, and some magazines I would read over some blogs. Obviously blogs are less mainstream and can be more honest because they are less dependent on advertisers. But magazines need advertisers to survive, and the labels they advertise need them. Even though most magazines act really happy about everything, as long as I know to still make my own opinions it isn't a big deal. A lot of them do lack in actual opinion, but that's where some blogs are good. And then blogs lack in the ability to take you to another world, and that's where magazines are good. But this isn't always the case, and not all magazines lack in things blogs have, and not all blogs lack in things magazines have...you can go around in circles forever. It just comes down to the fact that all magazines and blogs are different and you can't compare the two mediums.

I used to have the idea that magazines - just magazines in general - are evil and focused on trends and skinny people, but it is so not true. A magazine is like a public journal with entries written every month, or every other month, or 4 times or twice or once a year. Yeah, some are super lame and bland and really do only like rail-thin people, but not all of them. And when you find those that are more like art books or just simple celebrations of fashion, like the ones below, you become an addict like me. COME TO THE DARK SIDE. WE HAVE CUTOUTS OF LARA STONE AND FANGIRL TIM WALKER.

I treat most of my magazines like bibles. These here are the ones I don't cut out of and that will follow me to college and onward. From left: W, V, Interview, Flaunt, AnOther, 2 Pops, The Journal, Love, 10, another Pop, i-D, 3 Dazed & Confused's, 2 British Vogues, 2 Russh's, 2 Lulas, Vogue Italia, Harper's Bazaar, T, and New York Magazine. Since I took this picture in late September, another i-D, another Vogue Italia, another Harper's Bazaar and a Vanity Fair have been added to the shelf. At night I like to hug them and smell their paper and be creepy.When I really like scans I see on fashion community sites, I go out and buy the magazine because I want to own it! Call me picky but just scans don't do it for me, and since I take no interest in buying video games or pools or whatever other kids my age buy, I don't mind spending $15 on a magazine as long as it's worth it (Lula, AnOther, and Vogue Italia are special!) There is nothing like that one editorial I was obsessed with for 3 months that I go back to a year later and then am instantly reminded of that time in fashion and in my personal style. Or owning that one issue of Dazed I knew I had to have because they had a feature on Grace Coddington, or the May 2008 issue of British Vogue because those Venetia Scott and Patrick Demarchelier editorials were REVELATIONS! On a more geeky level, I love the smell and texture of magazine paper, and even though they cost money, they're not instant, whatever; you can't compare them to blogs because, for the billionth time, each one is different!

So yeah, it's annoying to me that blogs like mine are supposed to be the Big Bad Anti-Magazines, but this is supposed to be more in defense of magazines than blogs that are supposed to be giving editors "a run for their money!" Not that I'm trying to find a ~cause~ to ~fight for~ or whatever and decided this is a terrible world issue, but unfortunately fashion is an art form that is so dependent on its customers in order to survive. W's number of pages went down 53% this September. And hey, remember that really epic fashion story in the August issue of The Face? OH WAIT NO IT'S DEAD. Yeah, let's not let that happen to any of mah bbs up there. The new September issue of Russh (even though I was stupid and left it in a hotel) is freakishly amazing. And Bazaar's Runway Report is so clean and neat and pretty. You can sure count on me to be counting my quarters at the counter of Barnes & Noble every few weeks. See ya there? Remember: Tim Walker fangirling.